


Vigilante Justice

by lusium



Category: Persona 4
Genre: Community: Badbadbathouse, Gen, I'm really not sure why this came out this way, More tags to be added as it continues, Rating and tags are subject to change, Relationships too more than likely, deanoned from kink meme, uh yeah
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-05-26
Updated: 2015-06-03
Packaged: 2018-04-01 07:30:35
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,608
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4011154
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lusium/pseuds/lusium
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>De-anoned from the Kinkmeme, </p><p>A Shopping trip turns into something much worse, And Souji isn't quite sure how to deal with it. Much less how he's supposed to deal with the sudden development in the form of a voice in the back of his mind. He can only hope the others don't find out, who knows what they would think of him then.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Souji

**Author's Note:**

> The prompt; http://badbadbathouse.livejournal.com/745.html?thread=28905#t28905

Its nothing different from his usual routine, stopping by Junes to talk to Yosuke about their routine they’re supposed to do for some sort of performance for something, he wasn’t sure which. Purchasing the necessary props he would need, a small container of white and red facepaint, he already have blues and greens back in his room. Synthetic feathers to line the cuffs of his outfit, and his weapon, a hard plastic katana, one that little kids use when they’re playing pretend. The thought made the corners of his mouth quirk up in a small smile. 

After a moment of thought, he decided to get something for Nanako, to make sure she didn’t feel left out when he would have to get ready for the performance that next night. He’d gathered everything he needed, and had a small conversation with Yosuke while the orange haired teen was stocking the shelves. However, on his way back towards the house, things only escalated.

* * *

The frantic beating of his heart sends his world spinning, mind barely registering the hard plastic clenched in his hand as silver eyes quickly dart over the trio standing in front of him. For a moment, he thinks his words have succeeded in convincing these men to drop their weapons, and for a moment, he wonders if his luck has turned around. However, as soon as he goes to adjust his weapon, the sword he purchased. A gunshot rings through the air, his body reacting without his prompting, dropping to the ground as pain shoots through his arm. 

He can feel the fabric of his shirt beginning to stick to him as blood seeps into the cloth. There’s a flash of fear in his mind as hands grab his arms, hauling him up to stare into the face of the leader. He can see their lips moving, though hears nothing more than the ringing of bells in his ears, before a phantom hand seems to rest itself on his shoulder, a chill of metal pressing into the bare skin beneath. He wants to get away, to break free of the hold these men have him in, so he can just go back to Nanako, even though she could take care of herself, he didn’t feel right leaving her home alone. The ringing fades just enough for him to hear a whispered voice, as though it’s trying to remain hidden from those on the outside, and for a moment, he wonders if he’s delusional.

_“I am thou, Thou art I.”_ The words float through the air as though simply a whisper from the wind. He can’t help but glance at the men holding his arms against his back, his weapon abandoned. Silently surprised that they couldn’t hear it, though his attention was forced back to the voice as the whisper continued, the chill of metal sliding from his shoulder towards his throat.

_“Thou hast opened thine eyes, the time, is **now** ”_ All at once, it feels as though his body has been electrified, sharp metal talons piercing painlessly into bare flesh, his eyes narrowing, and flashing a hue of gold. Though unaware of the change, He feels the hands holding his arms falter, his mouth curling back in a silent grin. 

“Per…” The ringing has fallen silent, as though anticipating something. “so…” The talons feel frighteningly real against his neck, a subtle warmth flooding from where he could guess the flesh of its palm to be. “na”

As the final syllable fell from his lips, his body jolted, as though electrified as the men jerked their hands away. For a moment, he isn’t sure why, even the leader backing away with wide eyes. Slowly, he turns, following their gaze before stumbling back. Behind him, stands a large, masked creature. Golden eyes fixated on the slowly backing away trio with obvious scorn, before finally focusing on him, as though expecting something. The whisper returns as its head snaps to the side, police sirens growing close, and frighteningly fast. Above, the clouds are coiling viciously. The rumble of thunder in the air promising rain.

_“Step, towards me.”_ It says, and he does, uncertain of why he was listening to it as a taloned hand ushers him behind it, barely touching his back as the hair on the back of his neck raises. A foreboding feeling resting in the pit of his stomach. As the silver haired teen pivots on the ball of his foot, intending to see what was happening, a flash of light obscured his vision, the obnoxious roar of thunder tearing through the air, followed shortly by terrified screams of the trio. He can smell burning fabric. His heart rate quickens.

He goes to see if they’re okay, but the sirens are almost here, too close for comfort as the creature wordlessly grabs him, pulls him close against its chest as it launched itself from the alley, barely able to hook claws into the side of the building, hauling itself over the edge as the cars tore around the corner. Before he can say anything, it sets him down, barely looking at his face as a careful talon pulls the fabric from his sleeve, the threads ripping away to reveal a bloodied wound. 

He’d forgotten about it, the adrenaline beginning to warn off as the creature starts to scrape against the wound. He hisses, trying to jerk his arm away with a warning growl from the creature. The voice presenting itself in his mind.

_“Calm yourself, I am removing the bullet from your arm.”_

And for a moment, Souji relaxes, of course, it wasn’t on his own terms. his body beginning to feel heavy, as exhaustion sets in. The sharp pain of his wound being touched the only thing keeping his eyes open, a quiet clatter the only thing to tell him the bullet had been removed. Even as he finds himself pulled to its chest, and air is suddenly beneath him as it returns to its full height, weapon abandoned as it hops from the roof of one building to another, following murmured directions.

He finds himself too tired to care about what this creature is, even as they touch the ground in the backyard of his uncles house, and feels his own feet hit the ground. A quiet whisper telling him to sleep, that he wouldn’t be able to stay awake for very long. When he turns to ask the creature just who it was, he finds it’s already gone. 

His eyes are no longer gold.

* * *

Its the next morning when he turns on the news, sitting quietly beside Nanako as she doodles something on a piece of paper, he isn’t paying much attention. However, as the news drones on, giving information about the weather, and something about a store and puppies? He’d slowly lost interest, until finally, Nanako seemed to have called his name, pointing at the television, where he could see scraps of burned fabric, and a scorch mark on the ground.

_“Last night in a freak electrical storm, Three men were severely injured, two fatally wounded, with what appeared to be claw marks from a large animal, presumably a bear. So keep an eye out…”_ His mind quickly toned the rest of the report out, his throat suddenly try and hands shaking, so it wasn’t just a dream. 

The whispers from the night before returned, along with the phantom claws trailing across the bare skin of his throat. 

_“I am thou, thou art I”_


	2. Yosuke

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm still surprised that this chapter came out with an even 2400 words, even after editing and revising a few things.

He could hear them growling as they walked, felt phantom claws dig into their shoulders when he would walk by other students on their way to the high school. Teeth dug into his lower lip out of habit as the growls slowly silenced, the claws removing themselves from his shoulders as he clenched his eyes shut. Trying to put the image of the clawed up asphalt where the… _creature_ had appeared the night before, acting as some sort of.. what was the word, a guardian? out of his mind. He doubted it would work, but thankfully it hadn’t said a word since he’d left the house to remind him of it. 

As he opened his eyes, he jumped, a more see-through version of the creature kneeled in front of him, examining him with about as much curiosity as a toddler, and the simple aura of _danger_ it let out forcing his heart to pound against his ribs, his breathing quickening subconsciously as its phantom hand brushed over his bandaged arm, trailing a talon silently down clothed skin. At that, Souji bit back a noise of pain, and forced himself to move, walking through its leg as his gaze went to the floor, a feeling of sadness flaring through his chest, and he couldn’t figure out why.

From the moment he’d sat down in his seat, to the moment Kashiwagi had clickity-clacked her way into the room on her high heels, the creature had been quiet, not a single sign of its presence, even in his head. No freezing talons against his throat, nor the feeling of electricity snaking through his limbs. Not even the growls in his skull. It was as though it had utterly, _vanished._

However, all good things had to come to an end it seemed, as once Kashiwagi decided to start class with the spewing of absolutely useless and, completely unneeded information, his eyes had changed to a hue of gold. The growls rippling through his skull with more ferocity than they had even the night before. Hands moved to his head, trying to silence the creature within as he curled in on himself, thankfully Kashiwagi had turned away, writing on the board in some spiel he didn’t quite catch. However, Yosuke, and Chie had noticed his distress. 

A hand touched carefully on his back, a growl leaving his throat immediately as the transparent version of the creature whipped around, talons mid-swipe, the sound making it pause, and the hand on his back jerk away.

As the snarls silenced, Souji managed to contain the pain, forcing himself to straighten his posture, and offer an apologetic look to the concerned brunette behind him. Only having a confused look flash across Yosukes' face.

“Dude? Since when were your eyes _yellow_?”

With the abruptness he’d stood up, most of the class looked at him, though his body felt as though it was on autopilot, moving without his mind telling it to as he jumped away, landing on another students desk, just two away from where Chie was sitting, the startled shouts ignored as he lept out through the door, feeling wood break under his weight as his shoes skidded against slick floors.

The panic rushing through his body was a foreign feeling, memories from the night before flooding into his mind. The shout from Kashiwagi was left hanging in the air as cold talons pushed him forward, the only words crossing his mind bringing a small sense of humor to his otherwise frantic situation

_Hardcore Parkour._

Souji could briefly feel the shock of slamming his weight into the wall before he’d shot off down the stairs, momentarily running on all fours as he landed on his hands, having barely enough sense in the current state to push himself back up, slamming himself against the front doors of the school, into the open air.

Still, he ran, hauling himself over the fence surrounding one of the houses nearby and landing in the backyard, silently thankful the inhabitants weren’t home, feeling eyes on his back with a brief glance over his shoulder to confirm his suspicions. The other students in his class, and several other classes, were staring out the window, watching his slow descent (or had he already started falling as fast as he could?) to rock bottom.

No matter how much he tried to get himself to stop, his body refused to obey, catching street poles to swing him around onto the roof of a passing car, hearing the horn blaring as he kicked off from the metal, scrabbling at low hanging gutters, barely strong enough to take his weight as he moved to the roof, rolling onto his back as soon as the talons in his mind had vanished, replaced instead by the transparent outline of the creature, its golden eyes darting around the area as people stared up at the roof.

He couldn’t believe what just happened. And honestly, he didn’t think it could get any worse than what it had.

… As usual, he was wrong.

“What is _wrong_ with you?” He shouted, momentarily forgetting where they were, watching as the creature turned on the balls of its feet to look at him, shock flashing through otherwise emotionless eyes at his outburst before the expression hardened. Its pupils narrowing to predatory slits.

 _”There is **nothing** wrong with protecting you.”_ The voice snarled, it's whisperlight tone gone as the metal on the creature's face shifted ever so slightly, giving him the impression of bared teeth.

The only thing Souji could think to respond with was a bitter laugh, his hand covering the side of his face. After a moment, the Fool pulled his hand away, all amusement gone from his eyes as he stalked closer to the growling creature. He didn’t understand why he was suddenly so… _frustrated_ , why he had the urge to just, hit something. And it didn’t click until he’d climbed onto the edge of the roof, crouched as he readied his body to spring to the next ledge. The creature was only influencing, if not _increasing_ the power his emotions had over his mind. Even more of a reason to get away from it, he supposed. pushing himself with as much force as he could muster to the next roof, feeling loose stones roll under his feet as he hauled himself up.

It couldn’t be so easy to get rid of this thing, he doubted it. And yet, the creature hadn’t moved, it’s form still standing as though it had been frozen in time, and for a moment, he wondered if it was alright, at least until golden eyes turned to glare into him. 

Souji turned his back to it, hopping down onto the nearest fire escape to get out of its line of sight, deciding it would be best to just, walk, to try and clear his mind.

Obviously it wasn’t that easy.

* * *

Shifting uneasily as the concerned faces of his friends watched his every movement, Souji simply opted to remain quiet, silently wishing for _something_ to happen, so he could just, _stop being stared at_. And, after whatever deity decided to humor him, they turned their attention to the surrounding people of Junes, seeing the occasional lingering gaze on his back before Yosuke had turned back to the silver haired teen.

“... It just, appeared? What’s that supposed to mean?” He asked, taking an idle sip of the juice box sitting in front of him. The continued insistence for an answer only making Souji cover his face with his hands, fingers parting slightly to show silver eyes peering out at his friends. 

“It just.. everything had gone quiet like I’d gone deaf and then, it started talking… I think. Saying something like; ‘I am thou, thou art I.’ it was using a very… old way of talking. I’m not sure what to think.” He explained, shaking his head a bit before deciding to continue, “Before I knew it, I had ended up saying the word; “persona,” and when I turned around, there it was. in all of it’s… giant, frightening glory. I think it was the cause of the electrical storm last night, and it’s what caused me to leave homeroom so fast.”

Yosuke only stared at him, words processing before the brunette, and the others gathered around had to stifle laughter into their hands. And honestly, Souji was starting to wonder if maybe he was going insane, Chie didn’t seem to know about any electrical storms nearby, and Yukiko was simply doing her best not to enter another giggle fit. Even Yosuke didn’t seem to believe him. Which for some reason, made him feel almost a little betrayed. Damn thoughts influencing his emotions.

After what seemed like hours, they finally managed to calm down, Yosuke adjusting his posture to lean more across the table, watching his face quietly before shrugging.

“It’s nothing against you dude, but that sounds like something out of some weird dream you had after eating all those weird things in your fridge again.” Yosuke told him, his attention immediately returning to the juice box at the discovery that, yes, he still had some juice in it. A happy noise leaving the magician’s throat.

“That was one time!” Souji muttered, arms crossing over his chest in feigned annoyance at the repeated reminder of the half asleep rummage through the fridge bringing the results of some type of grass, mixed with what he was guessing at the time was glue. And even against their advice, he’d eaten it. 

“Still, it just doesn’t seem… likely? It’s as though you’re suggesting that you have some sort of spirit in your mind that only shows itself when you’re trying not to think about it, or in some sort of situation you don’t want to be in.” Chie said finally, breaking the silence she’d been in. Yukiko only nodding in agreement beside her.

“Anyway, what’re you worrying about? Our performance will be fine. I mean yeah we still need a little practice but whatever.” Yosuke shrugged.

* * *

Why did Yosuke have to say that? Why did he have to jinx it. Everything in the performance was going as planned, no little slip ups, no mistakes with dialogue. _nothing_ had gone wrong, not even the whispers had made an appearance. Up until the part he and Yosuke were supposed to ‘fight,’ just motions to make it look like they were hurting each other, (and fake weapons just in case they actually did.)

As soon as he’d drawn his sword from its sheath, jumping back from Yosukes' pair of plastic kunai, a growl escaped his throat. Hues of silver turning gold as the whispers began, cold talons making themselves known against the backs of his hands as he felt himself move. Unknowingly acting as the creature’s little puppet. 

_”Danger, exterminate.”_ the whispers hissed, each word dripping with poison as he lunged, a hand peeling away from the grip of the katana to swat the kunai from the brunette's hands, forcing himself to jump back against the insisting snarls of the creature, trying to make him lunge at the other.

 _”No, he’s not dangerous!”_ the words fell dead on his tongue, unable to get the words out as the translucent form of the creature loomed in the corner of his eye, talons drawn back, ready to strike before he’d finally dropped the plastic sword, hands moving to his face as the whispers quickly grew in volume to shrieks. 

He could hear Yosuke calling him, felt himself stumble back a few steps back hitting the exit to the building; felt the door click open as he pressed his weight against it, managing to silence the creature long enough to focus. He had to get away from here, and _fast_. So he could deal with the creature, without someone being harmed. 

He could feel something tugging at the back of his mind as he ran, slamming himself into the walls of nearby buildings in his frantic pace, heard the concerned shout of Yosuke, and the creak of the door closing. Souji wasn’t certain how far he’d gone, or how long he’d been running, stopping only when the familiar appearance of vacant floodplains folded around him.

“Persona,” The words spilled from his mouth before he could think, watching the translucent form materialize in front of him with a dangerous aura, serpentine pupils focused down at him with a low snarl echoing through the air. 

Quick footsteps and a loud intake of air alerted him to Yosukes' arrival, golden eyes widening as a hand reached out, intending to catch the creature’s arm before it lunged, his fingers touching thin air as the jacket fluttered just out of reach. 

Time seemed to slow down as Souji spun around, intending to tell Yosuke to just turn and _run_ as fast as he could away from the floodplains, Only able to see a flash of gold as a muted voice reached his ears, seeing Yosuke step back with the words.

**”Jiraiya!”**

A hand partially blocked the sudden flash of light, eyes clenching shut to rid his vision of dancing spots. Looking up as the wind picked up, flashing by in viscous blades, tearing at his face as the creature, _his_ creature jumped back, cold talons encircling his wrist to yank him back, causing Souji to stumble a few steps before falling back. 

His gaze fell to a startled Yosuke, seeing the Magician arcana staring fearfully at the large frog like creature standing protectively above him, the white jumpsuit blindingly bright in fading light. And for a moment, if it hadn’t moved, he would have simply thought the yellow stars on its face to be floating, the Red scarf draped haphazardly around its throat as eye-stalk like ears angled back, Camouflage hands appearing from behind the golden teeth like arrow resting on its chest.

 _”Leave him.”_ the frog hissed, the stars on its palms spinning slowly as the wind coiled almost anxiously around it, a similar position being taken by the creature beside him, the rumble of thunder echoing overhead; the hair on the back of Soujis’ neck raising as chilled talons curled against his shoulders.


End file.
